Red rooster to phoenix

The history of reformed college fires and their impact on education

Abstract

The history of Hungarian Reformed higher education begins with 1531, the year in which the schools of Sárospatak and Pápa were taken over from their former owners, and, complemented by Debrecen in 1538, became the source of all that has been achieved in the field of education in the Reformed scene. Barely 30 years after the beginnings, the first tragic fire has already happened. In this paper, I examine the history of fires in our Reformed colleges and their wide-ranging impact from a historical and theological perspective. College fires followed each other from Debrecen (1564, 1802), Kolozsvár (Cluj-Napoca) (1655, 1798), Nagyenyed (Aiud) (1704) and Pápa (1788) up until the fatal burning down of the Ráday College: Budapest (2019). Following the incalculable destruction and the unimaginable sacrifices, the buildings that were destroyed by fire, were rebuilt as an example of sacrifice and collaboration to become spiritual beacons of Reformed education and Hungarian culture, revived both physically and spiritually.